As the light rain draped Wichita Tuesday morning, I found myself reflecting back to summers past on our family farm in central Kansas.
I’m sure it’s a case of selective memory, but rain in July seemed like such a rare treat we’d stop whatever we were working on for a few minutes in the barn or the shed and just watch the drops come down.
It wasn’t just that any moisture in July and August seemed like a bonus for the all-too-often thirsty soil. After days – sometimes weeks – of baking in the summer heat, it was wonderful to bask in the cool, damp air that the showers brought.
Granted, the showers were frequently so brief they wouldn’t bring enough moisture to bring a halt to field work. But as boosts to the spirit during a searing summer, they were hard to beat.
The National Weather Service issues those whenever visibility is going to become an issue for travelers.
I wonder how many of us could issue those every morning about ourselves until we’ve had a cup of coffee or picked up that cappuccino?
Strong winds flattened power poles and a couple of barns in Sumner County last night. More than a dozen utility poles were blown over south of Corbin, Sumner County Emergency Management director James Fair said.
A small shed was knocked down by Corbin, and a machine shed being built on the south edge of Perth was destroyed. A friend sent me a couple of photos of the damage.
The strong winds appear to be the result of a thunderstorm collapsing, Fair said. That send winds blasting out in all directions as they fell to the ground and flattened out.
“The wind in Corbin was coming out of the east,” Fair said. “The wind from the Perth area was south going north.”
The remnants of Hurricane Dolly are expected to bring rain to much of the state tonight, Tuesday and Wednesday, meteorologists say.
“We’re not going to see any toad-stranglers out there,” said Chance Hayes, warning coordination meteorologist for the Wichita branch of the National Weather Service.
But rainfall amounts above an inch will not be uncommon – particularly in central Kansas, he said.
Check conditions frequently on Tuesday, and avoid flooded streets and highways.
WeatherData CEO Mike Smith is being featured in an episode of the History Channel series “Shockwave” tonight at 9 p.m.
He’ll be talking about the famous video taken from under the Kansas Turnpike bridge on April 26, 1991, as a tornado passed nearby. Smith calls it the “Son of the Andover Tornado,” since it was the same day as that deadly EF-5, but it wasn’t the same twister that devastated portions of Haysville, Wichita and Andover.
Smith says that video caused “a great many problems,” because it gave people the incorrect impression that it was safe to take shelter under a bridge.
Hail fell in Marion County for seven solid minutes, but that wasn’t the most remarkable feature of the storms that erupted just north of Wichita Tuesday night.
What had people buzzing was the microburst that flattened four semi-trailer trucks on I-135, damaged dozens of cars and dropped so much hail north of Park City that it looked like it snowed. Authorities were debating about calling out snow plow trucks before sheriff’s deputies shoveled the road clear.
Microbursts happen when air races down to the surface from high up in a thunderstorm. The air flattens out as it reaches the ground, becoming winds that can easily top 100 miles an hour. The microbursts can happen when a thunderstorm is falling apart and the rain and winds collapse toward the surface.
Or they can occur when so much hail is falling that the stones rapidly cool the air beneath the thunderstorm. That temperature change prompts the air to drop.
The difference between a microburst and a downburst is the size of the downdraft. If it’s less than 1.5 miles, it’s a microburst. If it’s larger than that, it’s a downburst.
As those caught in the storm can attest, air dropping that fast can do plenty of damage.
On this date in 1918, a single lightning strike killed 504 sheep grazing in the Wasatch Mountains of Utah.
The Wasatch is a rugged mountain range that separates Salt Lake City and Park City and was featured in the 2002 Winter Olympics.
……..Wichita normally has its first 100-degree day on or about July 5, according to the National Weather Service. The city still hasn’t reached triple digits this year, and didn’t last year until Aug. 7.
There have even been a few years when Wichita never hit 100 during the summer, though the most recent case was 1927.
Years that see late-arriving 100s have one thing in common: plenty of moisture in the spring and early summer. That makes sense, really. Energy that would otherwise be pushing temperatures soaring is instead being spent returning moisture to the atmosphere.
On this date in 1936, the high temperature in Fredonia reached 121 degrees. That set a record for hottest temperature in Kansas which still stands.
But the heat wasn’t restricted to the southeast corner of the state. Just six days later after Fredonia hit 121, Alton in northcentral Kansas matched it.
…but they can still be striking to look at.
Here, for example, are a couple of photographs of a landspout that touched down briefly on July 8 in Stafford County near Seward. No damage has been reported. The images are on the National Weather Service’s Wichita Web site, and were photos sent to KSN by residents of the area.
